What’s the beat in the “Bug Beat”?
You’ve heard of news reporters who write regularly about crime. They’re said to cover the crime beat. The “Bug Beat” gets it name because it always covers a bug of some kind.

What is a bug anyway?
A bug can be a problem with your computer...a spy tool that secretly records conversations...a germ that makes you sick...even a compact car. “Bug” also means any little, creepy-crawly critter — insect or non-insect. Scientists who study insects (entomologists) reserve the word for a “true bug”, such as a stink bug. One of a true bug’s chief features is its beaklike “mouth”. Other people, including the “Bug Beat” writer, simply use “bug” as a friendly word for “insect”.

So what’s an insect?
It’s a small critter whose adult body comes in three parts: head, middle (thorax) and end (abdomen). It has six legs, usually two feelers (antennae) and often two or four wings. Contrast that with a spider, a non-insect with two body parts, eight legs, no antennae and no wings.

Depending on the kind (species) that hatches out of an egg, an insect commonly grows by

• shedding its tough outer layer (exoskeleton) several times, often changing from a wingless young (nymph) into a winged adult, OR • developing from a feeding stage (larva) to a resting/changing stage (pupa), then to an adult.

But even the insect with the biggest adult body mass in the world — the Goliath beetle (13x5 centimetres) — is still relatively small, like all bugs are.

Why do amazing feats seem almost common among bugs?
Well, get this: there are more species of bugs on this planet than all other animal species put together. Entomologists have identified about a million insect species, but they know there are many more — possibly 10 to 30 million in total!

Each bug species can create huge populations. Many lay masses of eggs and lay them frequently. Entomologist D.J. Borror figured that ordinary fruit flies — starting with one pair and ideal conditions — could produce enough generations in a year to make a tightly packed fruit-fly ball big enough to touch the Sun from here!

Why is there plenty of folklore about bugs?
Bugs live everywhere — from mountain tops to deep caves, from deserts to ice fields, from puddles to oceans, from forests to plains. They’re also in backyards and houses — including yours. Because bugs are so common the world over, they are bound to show up in the folklore of almost every country.

People frequently link insects with events that occur whenever the bugs happen to be around. A ladybug crosses the hand of a woman just before she becomes engaged to be married and — poof — the ladybug’s stroll is believed to predict a wedding.

Other folklore is based on a bug’s appearance. Butterflies are generally considered beautiful and often linked with positive things, such as good luck. But the frightening head and darting flight of a dragonfly have helped create bad-luck stories of a monster that attacks children who misbehave.

Of course, insects are neither lucky nor unlucky. Nor do their actions ever predict human events such as weddings. Bugs simply do what bugs do. And for us humans, that’s astonishing enough!